Lead Process Chemist (, , United Kingdom)

About Anaphite: At Anaphite we believe creative chemistry will accelerate the energy transition. Our mission is to decarbonise and improve battery production by helping the industry to shift to dry electrode coating. We work with the battery industry to optimise dry electrode coating, manufacturing better and more sustainable batteries at lower cost. Anaphite was founded in 2018 and is headquartered in central Bristol in the Southwest of the UK.

Summary: The chemistry team develops new and improved products and processes. This role will ensure that processes are developed with scale and performance in mind. They will lead a team to understand, improve, and validate chemical processes at lab scale, targeting effectiveness and scalability. They will transfer processes to the scale-up team, following its progress and supporting pilot-scale process development with lab-scale experiments when needed. The person will contribute to Anaphite’s growth of know-how and IP with novel ideas & improvements.

Responsibilities/Duties:

• Technical responsibilities: Lead programmes of work to discover, develop, and validate improved materials production processes and lead the process development team to scale up small-scale processes (10-100 g) to small pilot (1-10 kg) scale.
• Project management responsibilities: Work with the Battery Team to coordinate product/process development and execute efficiently on Anaphite’s strategic goals; liaise internally (to scaleup engineering team) and externally (to external partners) to ensure smooth transfer of technology, understanding, and capability; coach the process development team to identify problems, solve problems, and source resources where necessary to do so.
• Contribution to IP: Keep up to date with industry and research developments; drive the team to contribute to IP capturing and lead filing of patents when necessary.
• Setting high standards: Uphold and promote excellent safety practices in the laboratory; set the standard research and reporting standards within the process development team; represent Anaphite in external projects, conferences, to customers and prospective candidates.
• Collaborative working: Keep good lines of communication between colleagues and stakeholders; support the team and their relationships with other teams, specifically: collaborating with early-stage process discovery scientists in defining and developing commercially relevant process technology; collaborating with the scale up team to ensure process development follows scale-up requirements; collaborating with the Electrodes and Cells teams to communicate and understand changes to materials produced with developed processes; contributing to the development of product specification documents and know-how, to ensure the correct knowledge transfer of technologies between teams and customers.

Required Proficiencies/Experience:

• Essential: Industrial experience of 4 years and above or relevant post-doc experience in a university; experience leading a technical group (e.g. 2-4 people), either in a project or in a line management capacity; process optimisation for products with predefined specifications; involvement in scaling of complex chemical processes by a factor of at least 100.
• Desirable: Project management training or experience; polymer or protein chemistry, colloid chemistry, or similar type of science; knowledge of battery materials, specifically for lithium ion batteries; attending/presenting at conferences and symposiums; hands-on experience with or advanced knowledge of materials characterisation methods.

Salary/Benefits: £56,511 - £76,073 annually depending on experience; learning and development for career progression - opportunities to attend conferences, mentorship and chartership opportunities, paid study leave, participate in outreach activities and give back to the community; compelling sign on share options bonus with the potential for significant future value; Vitality health insurance package including dental, optical, mental and general health; discounts and rewards through our Vitality app such as gym memberships, headspace app and much more! Work/life balance (enhanced maternity, paternity and adoption leave, paid bereavement leave, enhanced sick pay); flexible working outside of core hours 10am-4pm; £1500 towards relocation expenses, if applicable; free on-site parking; referral scheme if you recommend colleagues to the organisation; 25 days holiday plus 8 statutory bank holidays (increasing up to 30 days with continuous service); electric car scheme (Salary Sacrifice); weekly fruit delivery & breakfast club; Anaphite pension scheme and Anaphite regular socials.

At Anaphite, we don’t just accept difference but we celebrate it, we support it and we thrive on it. We’re consciously building a diverse and inclusive team therefore we encourage applicants from all social backgrounds, ethnicities, disabilities, gender identities, and sexual orientations. We want everyone to feel that Anaphite is a place where you can be yourself and where you belong.

We want to empower everyone to be the best version of themselves during the application or interview process, so if you require any advice or reasonable adjustments, please feel free to email on gabrielle@anaphite.com or lena@anaphite.com. Please note that we review and progress applications on a rolling basis.